The 50 Who Matter Now

In our second annual ranking, Business 2.0 has compiled an unabashedly subjective list of people, products, trends, and ideas that are transforming the world of business.

Doug Melton
Doug Melton
Co-director, Harvard Stem Cell Institute

Rank: 42

Why he matters: For a while it looked as though the South Koreans were winning the race to find real-world uses for human stem cells. But when their research program melted down in a data-faking scandal, Melton emerged as the prime mover in a field that could someday offer treatments for everything from cancer to diabetes to Parkinson's disease.

When the White House cut funding for experiments based on stem cells taken from human embryos, Melton used private donations to create 30 embryonic stem-cell lines and distribute them to labs around the world. His cells, and scientists he trained, are now driving the research agenda in this promising field.

Adelson

Calacanis

Bianchini

Iacobucci, Raburn

Graham

You

Williams

Musk

Melton

O'Reilly

Edmond

Zell

Huffington

Fake Steve Jobs

Walsh

Draft

Zuckerberg

Branson

Nooyi

Ambani bros.

Phillips

Negroponte

Hundt

Friis, Zennstrom

Cogan

Rosedale

Fadell

Kao

Arrington

Stephenson

Miyamoto

Eberhard

Agile software

Li

Diller

Chizen

Hurd

Wales

Bezos

McAndrews

Watanabe

Chambers

Schwarzenegger

Decker

Murdoch

Jacobs

Moritz

Private equity

Jobs

Google trio
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Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.